The Great Famine of 1695–1697, or simply the Great Famine, was a catastrophic

famine A famine is a widespread scarcity of food caused by several possible factors, including, but not limited to war, natural disasters, crop failure, widespread poverty, an Financial crisis, economic catastrophe or government policies. This phenom ...

that affected the present

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

and

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

(1695–1697),

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

(in 1696) and

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

(1696–1698), all of which belonged to the

Swedish Empire The Swedish Empire or the Great Power era () was the period in Swedish history spanning much of the 17th and early 18th centuries during which Sweden became a European great power that exercised territorial control over much of the Baltic regi ...

with the exception of Norway. The Great Famine of 1695–1697 was concurrent with the " Seven Ill Years", a period of national famine in

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

in the 1690s.

Estonia

Finland

In Finland, then part of Sweden, the Great Famine of 1695–97 was also referred to as "The Years of Many Deaths" (''Suuret kuolonvuodet'') by some Finnish historians, because it killed about a third of the Finnish population in only two years, or about 150,000 out of 500,000. People widely relied on eating bark bread. It was Finland's worst demographic catastrophe. The summer of 1695 was particularly cold, and grains grew abnormally slowly. Rye was reported to grow as late as August 6, and early frost destroyed the little that had grown. January and February 1696 were exceptionally warm, and the harvest was started as early as mid-February, but the frost that came in March destroyed the harvest again. The abundant snow caused massive floods in the Spring, which delayed the harvest again. People resorted to begging on the streets for food, and even cannibalism was reported at least once. The consumption of

famine food A famine food or poverty food is any inexpensive or ready available food used to nourish people in times of hunger and starvation, whether caused by extreme poverty, such as during economic depression or war, or by natural disasters such as dro ...

s appears to have caused death by

diarrhea Diarrhea (American English), also spelled diarrhoea or diarrhœa (British English), is the condition of having at least three loose, liquid, or watery bowel movements in a day. It often lasts for a few days and can result in dehydration d ...

in 1696. Mortality peaked in the spring and summer of 1697, with the spread of

dysentery Dysentery ( , ), historically known as the bloody flux, is a type of gastroenteritis that results in bloody diarrhea. Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. Complications may include dehyd ...

typhus Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposu ...

and

typhoid Typhoid fever, also known simply as typhoid, is a disease caused by ''Salmonella enterica'' serotype Typhi bacteria, also called ''Salmonella'' Typhi. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often ther ...

Sweden

From 1688 onward, Sweden had been affected by early

frost Frost is a thin layer of ice on a solid surface, which forms from water vapor that deposits onto a freezing surface. Frost forms when the air contains more water vapor than it can normally hold at a specific temperature. The process is simila ...

and bad harvests. This culminated in the winter of 1695, which was described as the coldest since 1658 and the

rye Rye (''Secale cereale'') is a grass grown extensively as a grain, a cover crop and a forage crop. It is grown principally in an area from Eastern and Northern Europe into Russia. It is much more tolerant of cold weather and poor soil than o ...

did not flower before July. Because of this, the Great Famine of 1695 is also referred to as ''Det stora svartåret'' ("The Great Black Year"). The harvest of 1696, furthermore, was reportedly so bad that each farm produced only one loaf of

bread. Outside of Finland, the northernmost provinces of Sweden were the most severely affected. Desperate famine victims from the countryside left for the cities in search for food, especially to the capital of Stockholm, where in the spring of 1697 the streets were reportedly strewn with corpses and people dying of starvation. During 1696–1698, the crude death rate in northern and central Sweden was over double its normal value. In the south, the surplus from

Scania Scania ( ), also known by its native name of Skåne (), is the southernmost of the historical provinces of Sweden, provinces () of Sweden. Located in the south tip of the geographical region of Götaland, the province is roughly conterminous w ...

's modest harvest was sent to adjacent counties; in addition, several hundred thousand barrels of grain were imported from the Baltics. Israel Kolmodin wrote the psalm '' Den blomstertid nu kommer'' in 1695 in connection to the famine, intended as a prayer to God that the next summer would bring food.

Norway

Following a year with epidemic-related mortality and a failed September harvest (due to cold) in 1695, the famine hit major parts of Norway in the winter and spring of 1696.
For an open-access near-equivalent of this chapter, see

Causes

The 1690s marked the lowest point of the

Little Ice Age The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of regional cooling, particularly pronounced in the North Atlantic region. It was not a true ice age of global extent. The term was introduced into scientific literature by François E. Matthes in 1939. Mat ...

, of colder and wetter weather.I. D. White, "Rural Settlement 1500–1770", in M. Lynch, ed., ''Oxford Companion to Scottish History'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), , pp. 542–3. This reduced the elevation at which crops could be grown and shortened the growing season by up to two months in extreme years, as it did in the 1690s.T. C. Smout, "Land and sea: the environment", in T. M. Devine and J. Wormald, eds, ''The Oxford Handbook of Modern Scottish History'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), , pp. 22–3. The massive eruptions of volcanoes at

Hekla Hekla (), or Hecla, is an active stratovolcano in the south of Iceland with a height of . Hekla is one of Iceland's most active volcanoes; over 20 eruptions have occurred in and around the volcano since the year 1210. During the Middle Ages, th ...

in Iceland (1693) and Serua (1693) and Aboina (1694) in Indonesia may also have polluted the atmosphere and filtered out significant amounts of sunlight.I. Morrison, "Climate: ", in M. Lynch, ed., ''Oxford Companion to Scottish History'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), , pp. 99–101.

References